Eleanor became suddenly conscious that tense stillness reigned in the county court room. Some man standing behind the back benches shuffled his feet and cleared his throat with an offensive "hem." The roomful of people looked back angrily. The attorney had pencilled a line on a scrap of paper and shoved it across in front of the coroner. Through the open windows, Eleanor could see that a great concourse of people was gathering outside. "When you found the body, was anyone else present at the top of the shaft?" For the fraction of a second, Eleanor wondered if they meant to cast suspicion on the Ranger. "Yes," answered Wayland, "the woman, Calamity was lying on the ground sobbing to break her heart. No one else was visible." "You say the wound was such that it could not possibly have been self-inflicted?" "You determined that for yourselves, when you examined the body," answered Wayland. "Was the woman's position such that she might have shot him?" "The shot was in the right temple, close; close enough to scorch the face! You have the record of that! The woman was kneeling on the ground a little to the left facing him." "Did she carry a weapon?" "She did not." "How do you know she had not one concealed?" "Because I caught her by the shoulders and lifted her up and shook her and said, 'Calamity, who did this?'" "What did she answer?" The attorney was on his feet with a bang of his fist on the table that shut off the answer: "Mr. Coroner, this evidence has proceeded far enough to show that the death of the deceased gentleman had absolutely no connection whatever with the official examination of the mines. The dead cannot defend themselves. Out of respect to the deceased and the member of his family--" "That," interrupted Matthews, breaking from his chair, "is the third time th' insinuation has been thrown out that MacDonald had things in his life that wud na bear tellin'! A know his life: A know all his life: ask me!" But the attorney and the coroner were in an endless wrangle as to law, that was Hebrew to the listeners, and gave the roomful of spectators ample time to imbibe the false impression that was meant to be conveyed, and to pass it to the prurient crowd outside. After a half hour of reading from authorities to prove that the answer was inadmissible as evidence, and another half hour rattling off counter authorities at such a rate the listeners could not possibly judge for themselves, the coroner reserved decision as to whether that answer could be admitted as evidence or not, coming as it did from a person plainly of unsound mind. "What next happened?" "I tied a stone to the cut end of the cable and unrolled the rope on the hoist and gave it a hard enough pitch to send the stone past the bend in the shaft." "And when you turned to work the hoist and bring up the others?"